Wednesday, March 29, 2006

CALFED spent a billion dollars.

This article about a student design contest focused on the Delta came over the water news about a week ago. I thought the winning idea - that the Delta become a national park, with historic towns, biking trails, observation posts and eco-housing – sounded like a nice place to visit. Except that even if the federal government weren’t trying to sell the lands they already hold, and even if the national government could manage the Delta better than the local government an hour’s drive away, why the hell would the state of California want to cede control over the linchpin of its water infrastructure to anyone?

So I was already shaking my head at the annoying graduate students when I got to this quote from one of the prizewinners:

“Nobody in California understands how important the Delta is for California or the United States.”

I would like to reassure her that there are people in California who do understand how important the Delta is. I know of people who have worked professionally on Delta issues for longer than she has been alive! Some of those people have even become important! It would be an exaggeration to say that my very own state agency does nothing but focus on the Bay-Delta, but it would not be an exaggeration to say that about this state agency! My agency has been known to spare a thought for the Delta too. Why, we have an office dedicated to the Delta! And we publish this, which I bet she used in her project! And we talk about itall the fucking time!

Look, I remember being an annoying graduate student and an insufferable undergraduate. I myself have been misquoted in newspaper articles. But I think that what she really meant to say was “I had never heard of the Delta until I did this project.” Which is totally legit. I only know it because it is my field, and I know precious little about landscape architecture. Still, I think I would stop myself before telling a newspaper reporter that nobody in California understands the importance of sprawl.